This article has been in draft mode for several months and I thought the timing was right to publish it. First let me state that my love affair and relationship with IBM Notes and Domino is now in it’s twenty-first year. So much of my identity as an adult has been tied to the people and technology involved with Notes/Domino. Whether it was my work at Underwriters Laboratories, OpenNTF, SHARP, Taking Notes, Elguji or my consulting customers; everything I did was intertwined together with Notes/Domino being the common thread. I am writing at this time to share the current “state of the union” as it pertains to IBM’s Notes and Domino.

Here is the first part of my address which, focusses on the Independent Software Vendor (ISV) and Business Partner ecosystems. Frankly, it’s the shortest section of my address. The next part will focus on IBM Notes and Domino customers and my thoughts on what they should be planning for.

The State of the ISV and Business Partners

First let me speak from an ISV and Business Partner perspective. Elguji and our IdeaJam software created an amazing opportunity to sell a packaged software application for IBM Domino. We set out in 2007 to prove a few points. The first point was to prove that Domino was an extremely capable environment for creating Web 2.0 apps. Secondly, we were fortunate to have sold a lot of licenses. To this day we continue to sell and improve both our IdeaJam and IQJam products.

It’s no secret that the overall ISV market has drastically shrunk. Sure there are some great ISV offerings out there to help manage Notes and Domino infrastructures, mobile app and other development tools, but its not like what we had say 10 years ago with hundreds of ISVs. One of the things that I hoped would happen and didn’t, was that a web app ecosystem would have developed. Especially with the introduction of XPages and the IBM XWork server. I am aware of a few ISV’s who have created vertical apps with XPages and the XWork server who are doing quite well. This is awesome.

A new PaaS offering was announced at IBM Connect 2014 based on SoftLayer however, I’m not really seeing this as a play for ISV’s to create cloud apps. Much like hosting market leader Prominic do today (and do it very well – Elguji is a happy customer).

The number of exhibitors at the annual IBM Connect (Lotusphere) Product Showcase has also gone down significantly. Frankly, I didn’t recognize many of the exhibitor names at this years conference. Sure, the big ones like Panagenda, Teamstudio, Ytria, BCC and others were there, but not the dozens that used to exhibit.

It was a rich app ecosystem that helped propel the adoption and allure of Notes and Domino in the enterprise. So the question becomes: How can this be turned around or changed? At this point, I’m not quite sure if it can or even needs to be changed. Is there even a need for 3rd party products and apps?

It’s no secret that OpenNTF has helped shape the IBM Collaboration Solutions app dev ecosystem over the last thirteen years. At IBM Connect you have an opportunity and in some way an obligation to attend the OpenNTF Birds-of-a-Feather session at IBM Connect. It will be an hour of well spent discussion, strategy and relationship building.

If you are developing apps for anything IBM Collaboration Solution (Notes/Domino/Connections/Kenexa/Portal/etc.) please carve out an hour from your schedule on Tuesday morning for this session:

BOF405 – OpenNTF – Grow with the Challenge

Tuesday | 07:00 – 08:00 | Swan Mockingbird 1 & 2

Let’s talk about the future of OpenNTF and Open Source for IBM Connections, IBM Sametime and IBM XWork Server. We would like to have an open discussion with you, how we can engage more developers in OpenSource Software and how the OpenNTF Ecosystem can profit from Open Source software as well.

If your company is using or plans to use IBM Connections I highly recommend that you go and visit the Kudos booth at IBM Connect to see a demo of their Kudos Boards app.

We love Activities in Connections. They are awesome! Working together on projects and leveraging Social Tools is a very powerful way of working. However some Activities can get BIG and sometimes users need to look at their tasks or organise the Activity slightly differently. Sometimes users don’t need to see everything that is going on but just one part. Sometimes it would be easier if Activities was more visual.

So wouldn’t it be great if you could visualise an Activity…as a Board….similar to a Kanban Board? Imagine if you could drag and drop your Tasks and Entries within Activities as progress and circumstances change . Wouldn’t it be neat if you could filter the content of your Boards by Person, by Priority, by Colour code, or by any other filter you want?

Here is something Adam Brown from ISW put together to showcase what Kudos Boards can do for your employees:

I’m also proud to say that I have been an adviser to Adam and ISW for both Kudos Badges and Kudos Boards.

The Connect 2014 conference agenda is built with one objective in mind: offering value to each individual attendee. Our mission is to have you walk away having learned something you cannot learn anywhere else AND having learned something that you can put to use in your business setting immediately. Last year over 350 top-notch speakers—clients, partners, and industry experts—shared their business stories and technical expertise with thousands of attendees, resulting in the highest session ratings in the history of the conference. The bar’s set high, but we’re ramping up to do it again at the 2014 conference!

Starting on January 7th, 2013 and going through June, 2013 I will be an instructor in the Computer Technology program at Vancouver’s Clark College. The four classes are:

Winter 2013 Quarter

Introduction to Programming and Problem Solving (CTEC 121)

HTML Essentials (CTEC 122 – two classes)

Introduction to PHP (CTEC 127)

Spring 2013 Quarter

Introduction to Programming and Problem Solving (CTEC 121)

HTML Essentials (CTEC 122 – two classes)

Advanced PHP (CTEC 127)

Teaching is something that I have always been interested in doing career-wise and, this opportunity provides me with an opportunity to give it a try. Over the last couple of weeks I have been guest lecturing and so far so good. The students are amazing and it’s a huge departure from the “enterprise” world that I came from. They offer a totally different perspective that I am welcoming with open arms.

At Elguji we are hard at work on IdeaJam 2.0 which is going to be a groundbreaking release. We have learned a lot about running a micro-ISV both in the on-premises world and the world of cloud computing. There are some amazing things you will be seeing from Elguji in 2013. We recently launched V1.3 of our popular IQJam product.

I will be at Connect 2013 with Gayle and will be delivering three sessions:

Apps, Apps, and More Apps: Meet the Very Best Open Source Apps from OpenNTF (with Niklas Heidloff)